


unaware i'm tearing you asunder

by middlecyclone



Category: The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt
Genre: M/M, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:07:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21939460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/middlecyclone/pseuds/middlecyclone
Summary: "There's blood in your hair," Potter said to me, after."Ah, is not mine," I said, "don't worry."
Relationships: Theodore Decker/Boris Pavlikovsky
Comments: 8
Kudos: 121
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	unaware i'm tearing you asunder

**Author's Note:**

  * For [avocadomoon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/avocadomoon/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide! Your prompt of "sad and painful and sexy" really spoke to everything I love about this ship, and I just couldn't resist writing this.
> 
> Title from Kate Bush's Running Up That Hill.

"There's blood in your hair," Potter said to me, after, when we were back in my flat in Antwerp, sprawled across the couch. _Rear Window_ was on the television and Potter was staring at me.

"Ah, is not mine," I said, "don't worry."

He blinked. "What? Boris, I think that's actually grosser."

All I could do was shrug at him. "Blood in hair, so what? Will come out eventually."

" _Eventually?_ Boris, take a fucking shower!"

"Can't," I said. "Was shot in arm, remember? Is hard to shampoo with one hand."

"Jesus." 

"Come on," I said, "stop talking. Am watching movie. Is very good."

"Boris, you've seen this about four hundred times. Wash your fucking hair."

"I am telling you, is too hard—"

"Then I'll wash your fucking hair for you," he said, "but I'm not sitting next to you while you've got blood from some fucking—gangster—in your fucking _hair—"_

"Okay," I said, "so wash it then."

I didn't know what I was doing, except it did feel gross, and this was Potter, and maybe I did know exactly what I was doing after all.

He looked at me, for just half a moment too long, and then rolled his eyes and stood. "Okay," he said, "okay."

I followed him to the bathroom. "What is best way to do this?"

He looked at my shower assessingly. "Maybe sit in the tub? I don't want to get water all over the floor."

"Is fine. I have maid coming tomorrow."

"Okay, then I don't want to get water all over myself. Just get in the damn tub."

I was starting to think better of this whole situation, but I wasn't going to back out now. I got in the damn tub.

"Take your shirt off," he ordered me, "it looks almost nice."

"Ooh, Potter," I said breathily, "always trying to get me out of clothes."

"Shut up, Boris."

I unbuttoned my shirt and let it slide off my arms; it wasn't easy, my left arm clumsy and painful, but I managed, handing it to Potter after. I started the faucet, letting it run and run until the water started to heat up. "Have to say," I joked, "this is little more casual than salon. Usually keep shirt on at salon."

He snorted. "You? Salon? Boris, I cannot imagine you going to a salon."

"Bah! What, you think my hair look this good all by itself? No! I live in lap of luxury. I pay beautiful blonde woman to cut hair."

"Of course you do." Potter rolled his eyes at me and then reached past me to the inner shelf of the shower, brushing my chest with the sleeve of his heavy wool sweater as he grabbed my shampoo. "Boris, what the hell is this?"

"Is shampoo. What is problem?"

"It's for children."

"Hair is hair! Does not matter!"

"It's watermelon scented. It has a cartoon fish on it. Where did you even get this?"

"Store."

_"Why?"_

"Like I said, does not matter! Watermelon smell is very nice! Little fish is also very nice! Do not see problem here."

Potter just sighed and got to his knees. "Whatever, Boris. Let's just get this over with."

I got to my knees, too, careful not to slip. I wished I'd taken my pants off, too, as my knees hit the damp ceramic of the tub floor, but it was a little late for that.

"Okay," Potter said, "just lean forward a bit—" He reached a hand out and placed it on the back of my head, carefully guiding me forward until he was pushing me under the gush of water from the faucet.

I jerked back, spluttering, as water dripping through my hair and up my nose. "Ah!"

"Don't be a baby, Boris."

"Am not baby! Was being waterboarded! Against Geneva Convention, Potter. No war crimes in bathroom."

"Okay," Potter said, "God, sorry, Boris. Then I'll just—" And then he was pulling off his own sweater and pants and climbing into the shower with me.

"Well hello, Potter," I said, trying for a purr, but there was still water in my lungs and it came out more like a cough.

"Shut up," he said idly, but I swear I caught him blushing around the neck. "This is just—the best way." 

"Whatever you say, Potter," I said, "now clean me up."

"I hope it gets in your eyes," he muttered as he squeezed a pool of violently pink shampoo into his palm.

"Is no tears," I said proudly, "does not matter."

He pulled the lever to switch the flow of water from the faucet to the showerhead. "Too hot?"

"No. Feels good."

His hands were firm but gentle on my scalp as he began to rub the shampoo in, starting at the top of my head and moving forward, then down above my ears.

This close to him, I could see the lighter hazel flecks in his dark eyes, the moles on his neck, the way his brow furrowed in concentration as he focused all his attention on me.

"Turn around," he said, suddenly serious, voice almost husky. I obeyed. 

He shampooed more vigorously, working the dried blood out of my hair, combing through the mats with his fingers. I could feel the muscles in my neck and shoulders relax as I melted into his touch; the hot water and his confident hands easing all the tension out of my body. It just felt so impossibly good to have his hands on my head like that; my eyes shut involuntarily and I wanted to purr like a contented cat. 

It really was more like petting, now, Potter just softly working the suds through the strands of my hair. His mere presence behind me was comforting; I liked the feeling of his wider, taller frame, his solid warmth. I wanted to lean back into him, to rest my head on his shoulder, but I knew this wasn't what this was about.

But I couldn't help thinking about—well. About our nights in Las Vegas, drunk out of our minds, rolling around in Potter's bed in the dead of night. About the way I would wrap my arms around him when he awoke, shaking, from yet another nightmare. About the way he would shove me down into his mattress, get his hands around me, get my hands around him, and just—

"Okay," Potter said, "I think I got it all."

I swallowed. "Yes."

He didn't say anything else, then, but he grabbed my uninjured shoulder and spun me back around. He hadn't been as directly in the spray as I had, but he was still looking plenty damp, water sliding down his face and pooling in his collarbone.

He pushed a dripping lock of hair out of my eyes, and the gesture was so impossibly tender that I almost wanted to cry. I wondered then if maybe Potter was remembering the same things I was: the way we would curl together by the dim glow of the streetlights, sliding against each other, never speaking about it but always coming back for more.

He started combing through the mop of my hair with his fingers, then, careful and soft, and it was just too much. I couldn't take it. I reached up and grabbed his wrist. "Potter," I said, "you don't have to—"

"Fuck you, Boris," he said, no heat in the words, "you know I want to," and that's when he kissed me.

His mouth was soft, and warmer than I remembered. He'd kissed me before, or—well—I'd kissed him, just once, before he left me alone in the desert, with a bag full of drugs and a stolen painting. That had been a confession, an apology, a goodbye. This was different. This was better.

The water was still pounding down on us, steam filling the shower, Potter's face slick and damp as I cupped his cheek with my good hand. He pulled me closer to him and I was sure, then, that he was remembering the same things I was.

I kissed him back. Before, I had been trying to use a kiss to tell him all the things I didn't know how to say. This time, the only thing I was trying to say was that I wanted him. 

He opened his eyes and the pupils were blown huge. "Boris," he said, and started unbuttoning my pants.

"Potter," I said back, and dropped to my knees, and then—

* * *

"What are you going to do now?" Potter said to me, after.

"Not sure. Stick around here for little while, see how things go."

"You should—you should come back to New York with me." His voice cracked, just a little, which is how I knew he actually meant it.

"Can't," I said. "Business is here."

"So quit. Quit, and come with me."

"Potter, I can't—"

"Oh, come on," Potter said. "The money—surely the money is enough. The painting, _The Goldfinch_ , the reward—isn't it enough?" 

_Aren't I enough,_ is what I could tell he was leaving unsaid. But it wasn't so simple as that.

"I'm never out," I told him, and there was nothing else to say.


End file.
